82 MISTAKEN CONCEPTIONS CONCERNING [CH. Ill,

these are the cordials which they find most at hand
In the moments of serious thought, or of occasional
dejection; and sometimes perhaps in seasons of less
than ordinary self-complacency, they call in also to
their aid the general persuasion of the unbounded
mercy and pity of God. Yet persons of this descrip-
tion by no means disclaim a Saviour, or avowedly re-
linquish their title to a share in the benefits of his
death. They close their petitions with the name of
Christ; but if not chiefly from the effect of habit, or
out of decent conformity to the established faith, yet
surely with something of the same ambiguity of prin-
ciple, which influenced the expiring philosopher, when
he ordered the customary mark of homage to be paid
to the god of medicine.

Others go farther than this; for there are many
shades of difference between those who flatly re-
nounce, and those who cordially embrace the doc-
trine of redemption by Christ. This class has a
sort of general, indeterminate, and ill-understood de-
pendence on our blessed Saviour. But their hopes,
so far as they can be distinctly made out, appear
ultimately to rest on the persuasion that they are
now, through Christ, become members of a new dis-
pensation, wherein they will be tried by a more
lenient rule than that to which they must have been
otherwise subject. " God will not now be extreme
to mark what is done amiss; but will dispense with
the rigorous exactions of his law, too strict indeed for
such frail creatures as we are, to hope that we can
fulfil it. Christianity has moderated the requisitions
of Divine Justice; and all that is now required of us,
is thankfully to trust to the merits of Christ for the
pardon of our sins, and the acceptance of our sincere
though imperfect obedience. The frailties and infir-
mities to which our nature is liable, or to which our
situation in life exposes us, will not be severely